Mercy Among Raiders
by Narkaman Kavy
Summary: When the Lone Wanderer has to work alongside the Pitt Raiders, she feels she's at their mercy. But for the first time, she stood among her chem-addled enemies, who weren't trying to tear her apart, and hang up her limbs to decorate their domain. She discovers that under all of that chem abuse, pent-up rage, and savage nature is a broken people, not all bad. Much Raider language.


_AN: I chose to list OC as a character(s), however they'll appear later in the story. Also, the beginning of the story takes place in the Pitt, but most of the story is carried over to the Capital Wasteland. I hope you readers will be happy to know I've elaborated heavily on the Pitt Raiders' personalities and background, as you'll find throughout the story :) Reviews highly appreciated._

"And Gruber falls! Gruber falls!" The fight commentator shouts dramatically as the last fighter collapses in a pool of his own blood. There was so much, she could smell the iron in the air, and it wasn't helping her stomach. The radioactive barrels were emitting way too much radiation, making the geiger counter on her Pip-boy go nuts, and contrubiting to her nausea. She yearns for a deep breath of fresh air after the exhausting three round fight, but not here, deep in this musky, damp pit. The champion's gaze wanders up to the raiders and guards that'd been yelling and cheering down at her from above, bouncing and tugging on the cage lid with all of their hype. "The champion is toppled! A new slave rises from the gutter to join us! Welcome her, she's earned it!" The commentator brings the fight to a close, and another eruption of the crowd follows. Will an exhausted pant, she drops her combat shotgun, and it clatters on the ground as she approaches the fallen adversary, not caring that the bottom of her feet are now soaked in blood. She picks up Gruber's Sig 556, fitted with a scope and silencer. It was quite the steal, as it would definately aid her better than the louder, short ranged shotgun if she got into any more trouble. She stumbles to the rusty grate that leads out of the arena.

"Well now, what do we have here? A scrapper, huh?" Krenshaw had been chatting with the arena manager before the former slave arrived. He was actually impressed that the small women had walked out nearly unscathed, though he wouldn't openly admit it.

"Still standing after all three rounds." Faydra states as a matter-of-fact, watching as the victor clings to the gate to stay upright. "Well, barely. Were gonna need more fighters. She killed our best ones." She comments, also impressed.

"Lord Ashur's gonna wanna hear about this."

"Show her around first." She smiles in spite of Krenshaw, showing a bit of empathy for the girl. "Let her adapt."

He scoffs. "Yeah, alright. Congratulations, kid," He says in a louder tone for her to hear, and walks over to clap a hand on her shoulder, making her stumble a bit. "You're one of us now. And boy, did you put on a show." He gestures to the footlocker on the other side of the room. "Get your shit together. I'll show you around, introduce ya." He turns to leave, but looks back at her with slight distaste. "Change out of those slave rags first."

* * *

"Ah ah." Krenshaw waves a disapproving hand at her bright blue jumpsuit. "That shit's not gonna fly around here. You can't go waltzing around Uptown lookin' like some hoity-toity vault dweller."

She looks down at her suit with a frown.

"You gonna be a raider, you gotta look like one. Go see the Foreman. Maybe he can get you somethin'. Then meet me outside."

She reluctantly makes her way to Everett's office, greeting him at his desk.

"Hey."

He seems pleased to see her. "Come to get me more ingots from the Steelyard?"

"Nope. Sorry to disappoint you." The new confidence in her voice is evident. "Krenshaw sent me. I'm here to trade in my slave outfit." She holds out the rags she once wore, and his eyes widen.

"I can't believe it." He stands, walking around his desk. "You're the scab that made it outta the Hole." He walks over to his wall of filing cabinets, rummaging through a drawer. He turns his head toward her. "I gotta say, I've always liked you, kid. Knew you could do it." He turns back with a wad of clothes and in his hands, taking hers and handing over his. "Here, you'll look good in this."

"Thanks. One more thing." She peaks her head back from the corner she'd just turned. "Since I'm one of you guys now, I'm not taking any more of your shit. Treat me as an equal." Her confidence puts a grin on his face, and he holds his hands up in submission.

"Understood champ! Say no more."

"I'll see you around." He nods in response, a smile on his cracked lips.

She pushes open the door that led outside the Mill, relieved to be a free women. Krenshaw was standing outside the door, and he turns around at the sound.

"Looks good on ya." He looked up and down her new outfit. She'd fit in better wearing the leather pants Everett had given her, along with the knee and elbow guards, the oversized metal pauldron, over a skimpy red tank, cut high above the belly button. A little too high for her preference, he can tell as she pulls it down uncomfortably.

"You got a name, kid?"

"People call me Ruby."

"Ruby; like the stone? How cute." He admits flatly. "I like it."

Uptown was exactly what it sounded like. A town that was up. Three or more stories above the city streets, Uptown consisted of the hollowed out levels of buildings, connected by a network of rickety catwalks constructed of spare parts. They would connect buildings for blocks, leading through building floors or onto rooftops, where the Raiders would establish an accommodation or facility, or a dwelling for their own. Uptown was the Raiders' domain, and slaves were never allowed up there. On the flipside, Raiders could loiter Downtown if they pleased, be it patrolling or beating the slaves. The gang Krenshaw would introduce Ruby to usually stuck close to home, which was among the blocks between Haven and The Mill, and conveniently close to Vertigo Bar.

They were approaching the gate that she'd walked past so many times before, 'Uptown' written in spray paint under their feet. With the use of a key, the gate was open, and they went up a flight of stairs to a higher floor. She soon becomes aware of a distant banging noise, coming from an open room on the other side of the catwalk. That's exactly where Krenshaw was heading, and she follows close behind.

"O-Dog." He calls as they walk across. "Hey, O-Dog!" He calls again when no one replies, but the banging ceases.

"What the fuck is it? I'm in the middle of somethin'." A man calls from behind a set of privacy screens you'd find in a pre-war hospital. Ruby finds the man behind the screens, a big butcher knife in his hand, hacking at some meat on a metal table. The whole area looks pretty obscure, a giant metal medical table, brown with blood stains, an oven nearby, and a small medical equipment table on wheels wasn't too far away, stocked with various knives and saws. It left an unsettling feeling in her gut.

"I'm preparing some meat for the f—" He turns around to find an unfamiliar face. He almost flinches at how close the two were standing, and he leans against the table with his hands gripping the edges, blocking the meat from view.

"Sheezus. Do not fucking sneak up on me like that. You know how jumpy I am." This guy was donning a Quantum purple mohawk, with a vibrantly matching beard. Ruby holds back a comment, at the risk of insulting the raider. She guesses his outfit makes up for it, with his spike covered spaulders and metal cuirass. Anyone who wasn't a raider wouldn't want to throw down with him.

Krenshaw chuckles. "Yeah, it's why I did it."

"This the scab everyone's talkin about?" He nods to the unfamiliar women.

"Yep. This is Ruby." Krenshaw claps a hand onto her shoulder. "Introducin' her."

"Lookin' good newbie. Not too bullet-riddled I see. Go see my sister. She can fix you up with a new style." O-Dog offers, his eyes fixed on her full head of hair.

A few buildings and a couple of catwalks later, Krenshaw suddenly stops her when a sound comes from the radio on his belt.

"Gettin' some transmission from the boss. Go meet her while I talk to him." He shoves her ahead to what looked like a women, fighting with a melee weapon. She approaches the women, striking at a practice dummy with what appeared to be a sword. Radiation and the Pitt's disease had taken their toll on this poor soul. Her chocolate hair was beginning to fall out, and what hair she had was tied into thin fairytails.

Ruby softly taps her shoulder. "Excuse me, I—"

"Excuse me?" The raider mocks, after turning to face the stranger. "What are you, some kinda pussy?" Ruby doesn't know how to respond. "You got something to say, or are you just here to stare at the freak?" It was apparant why she would associate herself with such, the sores that mottled her face weren't too pretty. Ruby didn't know what would happen if she agreed, but she didn't want to find out.

"Freak? N—No one said you were a freak."

"I did." The women shrugs, waiting expectantly for a comeback.

"I'm Ruby. I— I know it's unfortunate you look like that, but it isn't your fault."

The raider rolls her eyes. "That's right. You're the goody two-shoes scab that made it to Uptown." She pinches the bridge of her nose, annoyed. "Now I gotta put up with your ass."

"A lot of people are suffering from the same thing." She tries her best to sound sympathetic. In truth, she didn't really look that hideous. "And for what it's worth, you're still very pretty." By now the raider had turned away, seemingly done with the conversation, but she turns back.

"You think that?" She asks in a low, strange tone, but looks behind Ruby to find Krenshaw walking toward them.

"You'd best get the fuck outta my face." She yells in a suddenly hostile tone, at Ruby, who quickly backs away. "Yeah, keep walkin', pal." She says when Krenshaw walks over to get Ruby, and they leave.

"That's Mona." He tells her when she's out of range. "She's all bark n' no bite if ya ask me." Ruby looks back at Mona, who smiles heartily at her before turning back to the practice dummy. "Moanin' about her looks like people would care." Ruby smiles at herself, happy at the thought of getting on the raider's good side, even if Mona didn't want to share that with the others. They make their way down the ramps to street level, Heading to where a massive building pierces the orange sky.

"Duke!" Krenshaw's head cranes up, calling toward an elevated walkway led up by another ramp. "Duke of Uptown." He stops infront of the structure, where Ruby finds a lone raider on a small platform, sitting against one of the many support poles. He swings a leg that hangs off the edge, with his other knee propping up his arm, a cigarette in that hand. He seems to be ignoring Krenshaw, admiring his cigarette before taking a finishing puff. "Don't act like you don't hear me, asshole."

The raider takes one look at Krenshaw before exhaling. He was a pale faced man with short blonde hair, that went in a strip down the center of his head. He'd too succumbed to the Pitt's painful looking side effects.

"Get down here, meet the new girl." At that, the man flicks his cigarette, and drops down from the railing, landing heavily onto his feet, and approaches the two.

"Lord Ashur's newest soldier?"

"Yep. Ruby fought her way outta the hole." Krenshaw squeezed her shoulder, giving it a shake.

"Do me a favor and introduce her to the rest of the family. I need to talk to Ashur."

Duke nods, and turns his gaze to Ruby. She didn't know if it was just her, but it seems the disease made everyone's eyes a brilliant azure. He seemed to have her full attention.

"Nice job, kid. I give you props." Duke admits when Krenshaw is out of earshot. "You're not the first to climb your way out of the mud." His voice is gravelly, matching his sickly appearence.

"Let's go." He taps her shoulder, coaxing her to follow him. They make it a few yards down the street before they spot a pack of raiders running toward them. Ruby tenses, slowing down to shy away behind Duke. A women begins shouting his name, and Ruby peaks out from behind the raider when they approach.

"Duke, man, you shoulda seen it!" The woman was catching her breath, like she'd been running for a while. "There was this convenient store we found, right? There was plenty of shit for us to take, so we took as much as we could, but we found a knocked over shelf that was blocking a whole other part of the store! Don't worry. We'll be back tomorrow. Check it out." She gestured to two men on either side of her, holding wooden crates in their arms. "Four crates of food—"

"And we got all these, man." A raider with a sandy blonde mohawk, clad in a spiky set of metal armor enthusiastically holds up about three or four bottles of various liquors in each hand.

"Jack, one of them's empty." Duke points out, seeming not too surprised. The raider looks in his hands, puzzled for a second. One could see clear through the bronze Vodka bottle among the ones he held.

"Oh, right. It was a long trip."

"Who's the sweet face?" One of the men holding the crates nods to Ruby, and Duke fills them in.

"Ruby. The new ex-scab."

"Hey if it ain't the champion of the Hole! Heard it was a hell of a show you put on down there. I'm Squill, O-Dog's sis." The women speaks up with a smile. Ruby could definitely see the resemblence. She shares her brother's preference for metal armor, and his sense of hairstyle, though she wore her hawk down the side of her head. "This dirtbag's Reddup," The raider who called her out was a black man with a shaved head, sharing the same sores as Duke that covered his body, though she couldn't see below his waist. "That's Jackson," Squill points to the raider with the liquor held in his fingers. "And this is Trouble Man." The other man holding the crates was another black raider, though he doesn't make an effort to greet her as the others did. He glares at her wordlessly, eyes narrowed, his mouth a thin bitter line.

"Don't let 'em get to you." Squill assures. "He doesn't talk much."

A crackling suddenly erupts from the radio hooked onto the collar of Duke's iconoclast suit. It was Krenshaw.

"Ashur wants to speak to the kid. Bring 'er up to Haven."

"Got it." He replies, and turns around to head for the tallest building in the Pitt.

"Hey before ya go," Squill calls after her. "Remind me to do somethin' about that hair of yours."

* * *

_AN: This first chapter was a bit uneventful, but promises for more absorbing chapters (this was just the beginning), and more Raiders to come. Thanks for reading :)_


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